Self contained retaining means for removable digging tooth

ABSTRACT

Self contained retaining means for removable digging teeth for digging buckets, wheels and the like. The digging tooth has a hollow interior portion in the form of a socket fitting along the leading end of a shank attached to and extending from the leading edge of a digger bucket. A retainer bar is carried by the shank for movement laterally of the shank and is held in position by a rubber insert in the bar and is retained to the shank when in its locked and release positions. The retainer bar has an upwardly opening slot positionable to register with a projection extending from the digger tooth into the socket. Access to the retainer bar for moving the bar into its locking and releasing positions is provided through the side walls of the tooth, to accommodate movement of the bar to position the slot into and out of alignment with the projection to release or hold the tooth to the shank.

United States Patent [191 Flippin SELF CONTAINED RETAINING MEANS FOR REMOVABLE DIGGING TOOTH [75] Inventor:

[73] Assignee: Barber-Greene Company, Aurora,

[22] Filed: Mar. 1, 1971 [21] Appl.No.: 119,533

James S. Flippin, Aurora, 111.

UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,618,873 11/1952 Hostetter ..37/142 A 2,994,140 8/1961 Launder ..37/142 A 3,330,055 7/1967 Petersen ..37/142 A FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLlCATlONS 1,071,493 6/1967 Great Britain ..299/92 [451 May t,1973

1,1 15,41 1 5/1968 Great Britain ..299/92 Primary Examiner-Edgar S. Burr AtzorneyMcDougall, Hersh & Sehott [5 7] ABSTRACT Self contained retaining means for removable digging teeth for digging buckets, wheels and the like. The digging tooth has a hollow interior portion in the form of a socket fitting along the leading end of a shank at tached to and extending from the leading edge of a digger bucket. A retainer bar is carried by the shank for movement laterally of the shank and is held in position by a rubber insert in the bar and is retained to the shank when in its locked and release positions. The retainer bar has an upwardly opening slot positionable to register with a projection extending from the digger tooth into the socket. Access to the retainer bar for moving the bar into its locking and releasing positions is provided through the side walls of the tooth, to accommodate movement of the bar to position the slot into and out of alignment with the projection to release or hold the tooth to the shank.

4 Claims, 5 Drawing Figures Patented May 1, 1973 m I )A 4/,

, INVENTPR. l/amesT F 49 W no/ways SELF CONTAINED RETAINING MEANS FOR REMOVABLE DIGGING TOOTH Til-IE FIELD OF THE INVENTION Locking device for removable digging teeth for digging wheels, buckets and the like.

BACKGROUND AND SUMMARY OF INVENTION Removable digging teeth for digging buckets have heretofore been in common use. Such digging teeth, however, have relied upon wedges or other complicated forms of retainers, such as a pin of rubber sandwiched between two pieces of steel which must be completely removed to remove the digger tooth from its shank, or wedge and spring arrangements used on the buckets of smaller sized ditchers. These locking devices are all subject to frequent loss and breakage.

By the present invention, a retainer bar retained to the shank for movement laterally of the shank, and positioned in its locked and released positions by the walls of the shank receiving socket in the digging tooth is provided, which is never removed and is accessible through the side walls of the socket of the shank to be driven to one side and allow tooth removal and to the other side to block removal of the tooth from the shank.

A principal object of the invention, therefore, is to provide a simple locking device for locking a digging tooth to its supporting shank, which is never removed from the shank.

A further object of the invention is to improve upon the locking retainers for locking removable digging teeth in position on their shanks, arranged with a view toward retaining the locking retainer to its shank and utmost simplicity in construction and efficiency in locking the digging tooth to its shank.

A further object of the invention is to improve upon the locking devices for locking digging teeth to their shanks heretofore in use by slidably mounting a retaining device in the shank, to be moved into and out of registry with a projection on the digging tooth, and to afford access to the retainer device to move the retainer device into its locking and release positions through the side walls of the digging tooth and held from removal from the shank by engagement with the side walls of the shank receiving socket of the digging tooth.

Other objects, features and advantages of the invention will be readily apparent from the following description of a preferred embodiment thereof, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, although variations and modifications may be effected without departing from the spirit and scope of the novel concepts of the disclosure.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. I is a view in side elevation of a digging tooth and shank showing the leading end portion of a digging bucket with a shank mounted thereon.

FIG. 2 is a front end view of the shank.

FIG. 3 is a view in side elevation of the shank.

FIG. 4 is a side elevational view of the retainer device; and

FIG. 5 is a sectional view taken substantially along line V--V of FIG. 1, showing the retainer device in position to retain the digging tooth to its shank.

DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENT OF INVENTION In the embodiment of the invention illustrated in the drawings, I have shown in FIG. I a fragment of the leading edge portion 10 of a digging bucket (not shown), which may be the digging bucket of a digging wheel, a scraper for a drag line or various other forms of buckets or scrapers commonly used for trenching, excavating and loading purposes. A series of shanks 11 are spaced along the leading edge of the digging bucket and extend forwardly therefrom for supporting digging teeth 12.

As shown in FIG. 1, the shank 11 has a thrust reacting surface 13 parallel to the bottom of the leading edge portion of the digger bucket and extending therealong a distance sufficient to accommodate said shank to take the lifting and twisting forces of digging. The thrust reaction surface 13 terminates at its forward end into a groove 15 extending across said shank and conforming to the leading edge of the digging bucket. The leading end portion of the shank is shown as being generally wedge-like in form, having a flat bottom surface 16 terminating at its leading end into an upwardly extending diverging retaining surface 17. The Wedge like leading end portion of the shank conforms to the form of a wedge-like socket 19 formed in the digging tooth 12 and opening to the rear end thereof (FIGS. 1 and 5).

The shank 11 has a forwardly facing and upwardly opening recess 20 therein to receive a locking projection 21 of the digging tooth 12. The locking projection 21 extends into the socket 19 and forms an abutment or retainer for retaining the digging tooth 12 to said socket, in cooperation with a locking or retainer bar 23 mounted in the shank 11 for movement laterally thereof. As shown in FIGS. 1 and 5, the retainer bar 23 is guided in a rectangular slot 25, extending transversely of said shank and disposed forwardly of the projection 21, and having a bottom portion disposed beneath said projection.

The projection 21 may be an integrally formed projection, or a roll pin or other form of pin, which may be driven through a circular hole 26 in the top wall of the digger tooth l2 and leading into the socket 19.

The digging tooth 12 has a generally pointed or wedge-like leading end 27 terminating into a relatively short surface 29 perpendicular to a top surface SI) of the digging tooth and providing a relatively blunt leading end portion for penetrating into dirt and the like with a minimum amount of wear.

The digging tooth is also provided with side walls 31 defining the outer vertical walls of the socket l9 and extending along opposite side walls of the shank II when the digging tooth is in place on the shank. Aligned holes 32 are provided in opposite side walls 31 of the socket 19, in alignment with the slot 25, but of a smaller diameter than the height of said slot, to afford access to the retainer bar 23, to enable said bar to be moved into a locked and released position by a drive pin (not shown) and the like.

The retainer bar 23 may be made from metal, such as steel or any other suitable metal and is herein shown as generally rectangular in form although it need not necessarily be rectangular. Said retainer bar is shorter than the width of the shank 11 and never projects beyond said shank when in its locked and released positions. The retainer bar 23 has an upwardly opening notch 33 extending thereacross, closer to one end than the other, and of a width substantially equal to the width of the recess and wider than the locking projection 21. The upwardly opening notch 33 is closer to one end of the retainer bar than the other and is herein shown as being so positioned relative to the length of said retainer bar that when the retainer bar 23 is moved along the slot 25 to the extreme left-hand end thereof, the slot 33 will be out of registry with the recess 20. The projection or abutment 21 will, therefore, come into engagement with the rear face of said retainer bar on attempts to remove the digging tooth from its shank, or when forces are set up that would tend to move the digging tooth outwardly along its shank. When, however, the retainer bar 23 is moved in a direction to engage the right-hand end thereof with the inner side of the side wall 31 of the socket 19 the notch 33 will register with the recess 20 and projection 21 and accommodate ready removal of the digging tooth from its shank. The retainer bar may, of course, be reversed in the slot 25, in which case the notch 33 will be at the right-hand end of the slot when in a locked position.

The retainer bar 23 is shown as having a rectangular recess 36 therein opening to the lower end of said bar and forming a receptacle for a rubber pad 37, recessed therein and suitably secured thereto. The rubber pad 37 projects downwardly of the bottom surface of the retainer bar 23, as clearly shown in FIG. 4, and is sufficiently compressed when inserted in the slot 25 to hold the retainer bar in position in said'slot and to thereby hold said retainer bar in its locking and release positions. The retainer bar must thus be driven to one end or the other of its slot, when it is desired to move said bar to release the digging tooth, or positively retain said digging tooth in position.

It may be seen from the foregoing that the retainer bar 23 is retained in the slot 25 when in its locked or release positions and thereby provides a self contained locking means which need never be removed from the shank except where it may be desired to replace the bar with a new one. It should further be noted that the inner side walls of he socket 19 serve as stops and retainers for the retainer bar and as a positioning means therefor, limiting movement of the bar into either its locking or its release positions, but still affording access to the bar from either end thereof through either of the aligned access holes 32.

The retainer bar 23 thus effectively prevents unauthorized removal of the tooth from its supporting shank and besides remaining in the shank at all times, accommodates tooth removal by a simple operation of driving the retainer bar to one extreme side of the shank, limited by the interior side walls of the socket 19.

I claim as my invention:

1. In a releasable retaining means for a digging tooth or the like including a shank projecting from the leading end of a digging bucket, a digging tooth releasably versely disgosed recess; b. a retainer ar received in said recess for transverse reciprocal sliding movement therein, which retainer bar has a notch therein; said digging tooth having a projection extending into said socket and disposed rearwardly of said retainer bar in interfering relationship with a portion of the latter when said digging tooth is mounted on said shank;

said digging tooth having a pair of aligned openings communicating with said socket and also communicating with respective opposite ends of said recess when said digging tooth is mounted on said shank, said openings permitting insertion of a tool into either end of said recess for forcibly sliding said retainer bar in both directions thereby alternately to position said notch and said portion of the retainer bar in alignment with said projection, said openings being shaped so as to be abutted by the ends of said retainer bar thereby to prevent removal of the latter from said recess when said digging tooth is mounted on said shank. 2. The combination of claim 1 wherein the retainer bar is non-circular in form, wherein the recess for said retainer bar extending transversely of said shank generally conforms to the form of said retainer bar,

and wherein means are provided to hold said retainer bar in position and accommodate the driving of said retainer bar to one side or the other of said shank to bring said retainer notch into and out of registry with said projection.

3. The combination of claim 2,

wherein the means for holding said retainer bar in position comprises a resilient insert extending along said bar and outwardly beyond one side thereof and compressively engaging a wall of said recess to retain said bar in position therein by the force created by the inherent tendency of said insert to expand.

4. The combination of claim 1,

wherein the retainer bar is rectangular in form,

wherein the recess for said bar generally conforms to the form of said bar,

wherein a resilient insert extends along one side of said bar and outwardly therefrom to retain said bar in position by the expansive force of said insert, and

wherein the notch in said bar registrable with said projection is disposed toward one end of said bar to register with said projection when said bar is at one end of said recess and to accommodate said bar to register with and interfere with outward movement of said projection when at the opposite end of said recess. 

1. In a releasable retaining means for a digging tooth or the like including a shank projecting from the leading end of a digging bucket, a digging tooth releasably carried on said shank, which tooth has a digging end and a socket disposed rearwardly of said end and opening at the rear end of said tooth, means for releasably retaining said digging tooth on said shank comprising: a. said shank being provided with a generally transversely disposed recess; b. a retainer bar received in said recess for transverse reciprocal sliding movement therein, which retainer bar has a notch therein; c. said digging tooth having a projection extending into said socket and disposed rearwardly of said retainer bar in interfering relationship with a portion of the latter when said digging tooth is mounted on said shank; d. said digging tooth having a pair of aligned openings communicating with said socket and also communicating with respective opposite ends of said recess when said digging tooth is mounted on said shank, said openings permitting insertion of a tool into either end of said recess for forcibly sliding said retainer bar in both directions thereby alternately to position said notch and said portion of the retainer bar in alignment with said projection, said openings being shaped so as to be abutted by the ends of said retainer bar therEby to prevent removal of the latter from said recess when said digging tooth is mounted on said shank.
 2. The combination of claim 1, wherein the retainer bar is non-circular in form, wherein the recess for said retainer bar extending transversely of said shank generally conforms to the form of said retainer bar, and wherein means are provided to hold said retainer bar in position and accommodate the driving of said retainer bar to one side or the other of said shank to bring said retainer notch into and out of registry with said projection.
 3. The combination of claim 2, wherein the means for holding said retainer bar in position comprises a resilient insert extending along said bar and outwardly beyond one side thereof and compressively engaging a wall of said recess to retain said bar in position therein by the force created by the inherent tendency of said insert to expand.
 4. The combination of claim 1, wherein the retainer bar is rectangular in form, wherein the recess for said bar generally conforms to the form of said bar, wherein a resilient insert extends along one side of said bar and outwardly therefrom to retain said bar in position by the expansive force of said insert, and wherein the notch in said bar registrable with said projection is disposed toward one end of said bar to register with said projection when said bar is at one end of said recess and to accommodate said bar to register with and interfere with outward movement of said projection when at the opposite end of said recess. 